“Our Kiwi Oscar brand fruit had excellent shelf life this year,” said Prim'land's Jean-Baptiste Pinel, “so we had fruit available for customers for longer.” As French supplies taper off in Europe, Chilean imports will satisfy demand on the continent. Harvesting has been underway in Chile for about a month, and the first containers of Kiwi Oscar fruit arrived.
“Chilean volume will be similar to that from the last season,” said Jean-Baptiste. “My feeling is it might be two or three percent down.” Demand was a little slow during the French season, and Jean-Baptiste is optimistic that will pick up when South American fruit arrives.
As far as competition from New Zealand fruit or golden varieties that are grown elsewhere, he doesn't see much conflict. “Yellow fruit is for customers who want more sugar and green fruit is for those who want fruit with a light acidity,” explained Jean-Baptiste. “With Chile and New Zealand, there are differences in size, color and other characteristics. You propose different products to customers, and they make decisions based on what they want.” In both cases, he noted, different varieties from different regions complement each other. “Still the competition is strong, but both areas want consumers to eat more kiwifruit and if the consumption is high, there is a good demand and a place for every shipper.”
“You look at a big supplier, like Zespri, and they do a lot of promotion,” he said. “That's a lot of promotion for kiwifruit in general. So this is actually good for us, and I am happy with this.”
For more information:
Jean Baptist Pinel
Prim'land
Jean-baptiste.Pinel@primland.fr
www.primland.fr